Danish People's Party
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| Danish People's Party Dansk Folkeparti |
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|---|---|
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| Leader | Pia Kjærsgaard |
| Founded | 1995 |
| Headquarters | Christiansborg, 1240 København K |
| Ideology | National conservatism, Social conservatism, Right-wing populism |
| International affiliation | None |
| European affiliation | None |
| European Parliament Group | Europe of Freedom and Democracy |
| Official colours | Red, White |
| Website | |
| www.danskfolkeparti.dk | |
| Politics of Denmark Political parties Elections |
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The Danish People's Party (Danish: Dansk Folkeparti) is a social conservative, national conservative political party in Denmark. In the 2007 parliamentary election, it took 25 seats in the 179-member Folketinget (an increase of 1 seat), with 13.8% of the vote, remaining the third largest party in Denmark. Its chairwoman is Pia Kjærsgaard.
Since 2001 the party has supported a government consisting of the Liberal and Conservative parties. While not being a part of the cabinet, the Danish People's Party maintains a close cooperation with the government parties on most issues.
In return for their support of the present liberal/conservative government, the Danish People's Party has required a legislative effort for a strict policy towards immigrants and potential refugees.[1]
In the 2009 elections for the European Parliament the prime candidate Morten Messerschmidt won his seat in a landslide with 284,500 personal votes; thus giving the party a second seat (which went to Anna Rosbach Andersen).[2]
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[edit] History
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The party was founded on October 6, 1995, after Pia Kjærsgaard, Kristian Thulesen Dahl, Poul Nødgaard and Ole Donner left the Progress Party. The party made its electoral debut in the 1998 Danish parliamentary election, winning 13 seats. Later, in the 2001 election, they won 22 seats. They became the third largest party in the parliament and supported the Conservative-Liberal coalition government, headed by Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, in exchange for the implementation of some of their key demands, for example strict policies on immigration. The party won 24 seats in the 2005 election.
In 2006, the party's popularity rose dramatically in opinion polls following the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy, at the expense of the Social Democrats. This effect, however, somewhat waned with the falling media attention to the cartoons controversy[3].
In the November 2007 parliamentary elections, the Danish People's Party got 13.9 % and 25 seats (a gain of 0.7 % and one seat). Thus, in every election since its founding the party has had a steady growth, although the growth rate has stagnated somewhat in recent years. An interesting feature, compared to other Danish parties, is that the Danish People's Party is usually underrepresented by about 1-1.5 % in opinion polls. Election researchers have suggested that the party's voters may be less interested in politics, and therefore declining to talk to pollsters, or that voters are reluctant to reveal non-polically-correct opinions to pollsters.[4]
[edit] Policies
[edit] Core issues
[edit] Immigration
- To drastically reduce immigration.
- To oppose islamisation and favour cultural assimilation of immigrants
[edit] Other domestic
- To improve conditions for the elderly and disabled
- Stricter punishments for crimes such as rape, violence, sexual abuse, reckless driving and cruelty to animals
- Improved animal welfare
- Grants for specific research into terrorism, Islamism and cold-war history
- Increased defense spending
- To maintain the monarchy and the current Danish constitution
- To abolish the blasphemy clause and 'hate speech' clause in the Danish criminal code
[edit] Foreign
- To oppose a reduction of Denmark's sovereignty by the EU
- To maintain the Danish krone and not implement the Euro
- Opposition to Turkish EU Membership
- Support of Israel in its conflict with Hamas
- Support of the US-led 'War on Terrorism'
- Harsher criticism of, and support for sanctions against, totalitarian regimes and dictatorships (especially communist and Islamist regimes)
[edit] Results
Cooperation with the Conservative-Liberal coalition government resulted in the implementation of some of their key demands, such as strong immigration restriction policies, which have resulted in what have been described as Europe's strictest immigration laws.[citation needed] The new government enacted rules that prevented Danish citizens and others from bringing a foreign spouse into the country unless both partners were aged 24 or over, passed a solvency test showing the Dane had not claimed social security for 12 months and could lodge a bond of 60,011 kroner (about 10,100 USD).[5] One declared aim of this was to fight arranged marriages. These new rules had the effect that while about 8,151 family reunification permits were granted in 2002, the number had fallen to 3,525 by 2005.[6] Some social benefits for refugees were also cut by 30-40% during their first seven years in the country, ordinary unemployment benefits being replaced by a reduced start-up aid. Whereas the government coalition's declared aim with this was to improve integration by inciting people to work, immigration spokesman Søren Krarup of the Danish People's Party has expressed his content in that the start-up aid has decreased the number of economic refugees greatly, showing them that "one does not find gold in the streets in Denmark".[7]
The DPP supported the coalition government in deploying Danish military forces to Iraq.
In March 2007, DPP representatives (such as Peter Skaarup) proposed that forced 'chemical castration' should be used on sexual offenders.[8]
[edit] Critique
The changes to Denmark's immigration laws drew some criticism from the former social democratic government of Sweden, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the Council of Europe's human rights commissioner. In a response to the criticism from the Swedish government Pia Kjaersgaard said: "If they want to turn Stockholm, Gothenburg or Malmö into a Scandinavian Beirut, with clan wars, honour killings and gang rapes, let them do it. We can always put a barrier on the Øresund Bridge."[9] The remark was offensive to many Swedes, and she later insisted that the remark about the Øresund Bridge was meant to be ironic.
[edit] Controversy
As a successor political party of the now defunct extreme right Progress Party (Fremskridtspartiet), originally founded by the controversial tax lawyer and politician Mogens Glistrup, the constant rise of the Danish People's Party has not gone unnoticed in the Danish and international political landscape. For instance, in 1999, then Danish Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen remarked that the Danish People's Party would never be house-trained, i.e. that their views would never be generally accepted in Danish politics (a statement for which he was later criticised).[10]
In 2003, Pia Kjærsgaard lost a libel suit against a Communist opponent, Karen Sunds, who had characterized her as having "racist views".[11] Two lower courts ruled in favour of Kjærsgaard, but the Supreme Court acquitted Sunds of libel. The court based its decision on a deposition of the Danish Language Board, stating that the word "racist" now has a wider meaning than just racism, including anything deemed "discriminating" or "xenophobic". This verdict leaned on a former ruling of the European Court of Human Rights.[12]
A member of parliament, Søren Krarup, has said that “Islam has for 1,400 years attempted to conquer and repress European Christianity...”[13] According to Le Monde of December 11, 2005, an imam requested the censure of Søren Krarup who, speaking in Parliament, drew a comparison between Muslim women who wear headscarves and totalitarian symbols: "It may sound offensive, but Islam is a totalitarian regime that has thousands of human lifes on its conscience. The headscarf is a symbol of this regime and the Quran may very well be compared with Hitler's 'Mein Kampf'."[13][14] Party leader Pia Kjærsgaard has also drawn domestic criticism for lashing out at Danish Islamic organizations who had criticized the publication of caricatures of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, by describing them as a "fifth column" and "seeds of weed".[15]
In August 2006 undercover journalists of the tabloid Ekstra Bladet contacted 18 local districts of the DPP, saying that they were members of Dansk Front and wanted to join the DPP. Dansk Front, or "Danish Front", is a now-defunct extreme-right network which among other things advocated the banning of Islam, and was accused by the Danish secret police of close cooperation with neo-Nazi groups such as Blood & Honour and Combat 18. Half of the Dansk Folkeparti district chairmen turned the request down, whereas the other half said party membership was OK, provided any extreme-right views were kept private. When the tabloid published the story, this caused a scandal, following which the latter nine district chairmen were excluded from the party.[16].
On May 5, 2008, Kristian Thulesen Dahl responded to criticism from Integration Minister Birte Rønn Hornbech (Venstre), who had called the Danish People's Party "fanatical anti-Muslims", by saying: "In many ways, we are anti-Muslims", but he, at the same time, denied that they were fanatical.[2]
[edit] The popularity of DPP
Since its meager beginnings, the party has grown at every single election. While opposition to mass immigration and Islamification is central to the aims of the party, other issues are thought to have added to the popularity of the party:
- Ideological Novelty: The DPP combines support of the welfare state, and particularly benefits for pensioners, with strongly conservative policies on immigration and law and order. As such it is distinctive from the mainstream parties and offers policies which appeal across the traditional right-left dividing line. Polls have shown that a great deal of the party's voters are former Social Democrats, concerned with the decline of the welfare state. An analysis by the trade union SiD after the 2001 election stated that among unskilled workers aged under 40, 30% voted for DPP and only 25% for the Social Democrats.[17]
- Euroscepticism: In Denmark, only two parties have been against all new EU treaties throughout their existence. Those parties are DPP and the left-wing Enhedslisten. Whereas most politicians favour a more dominant EU, public opinion is broadly skeptical and in favour of the nation state keeping its powers. Referendums brought the rejection of the Maastricht treaty and the Euro. The DPP has managed to harness this scepticism more effectively than the left-wingers.
- Outspokenness (populism): Some analysts believe that Pia Kjærsgaard, a former domestic nurse, appeals well to the 'common man' because she is different from the traditional political class of economists and academics. In combination with her critical stance towards non-Western immigration and Islam, this has given her strong support among workers and lower middle class voters. Danish political commentators generally acknowledge that Pia Kjærsgaard and her party maintain clear and direct stances on the most central political issues of the party[citation needed], and have been able to set the agenda more than the size of the party would make one expect.
[edit] Results
| Election | # of seats won | # of total votes | % of popular vote |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | 13 | 252,429 | 7.4% |
| 2001 | 22 | 413,987 | 12% |
| 2005 | 24 | 444,205 | 13.2% |
| 2007 | 25 | 479,532 | 13.8% |
[edit] See also
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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Danish People's Party |
[edit] Further reading
- Rydgren, Jens (May 2004). "Explaining the Emergence of Radical Right-Wing Populist Parties: The Case of Denmark". West European Politics 27 (3): 474–502. doi:.
[edit] References
- ^ Dansk Folkeparti: "Principprogram"
- ^ Personlige stemmer, Danmarks Statistik
- ^ http://www.catinet.dk/default.asp?page=opinion/df.html
- ^ (Danish) DF er bedre end meningsmålinger [Danish People's Party is better than opinion polls], TV2, 5 November 2007
- ^ http://www.udlst.dk/english/Family+Reunification/Spouses/Default.htm
- ^ http://www.udlst.dk/NR/rdonlyres/e6kr3ge46gzp36obsg2kgvmes7ahj4lqrpgowevsclj553ug6cemmug5c5ldnb7lajjb7cjiqfyi2g5gwjhzzuemkae/Jan+-+feb+2006.xls
- ^ Dagbladet Information, 8 December 2006
- ^ http://www.cphpost.dk/get/100666.html
- ^ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4276963.stm
- ^ http://www.ugebreveta4.dk/2006/34/Baggrundoganalyse/PoulNyrupfastholdersitsynpaDanskFolkeparti.aspx
- ^ [1]
- ^ http://www.ittext.dk/sunds.html
- ^ a b humanisme.dk, Quotes of Søren Krarup
- ^ UN report E/CN.4/2006/17
- ^ [ http://www.danskfolkeparti.dk/sw/frontend/newsletterpreview.asp?id=362&template_id=10&mbid=19083 http://www.danskfolkeparti.dk/sw/frontend/newsletterpreview.asp?id=362&template_id=10&mbid=19083]
- ^ http://www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Politik/2006/08/21/112708.htm
- ^ Dansk Folkeblad, vol. 4, 2002.
[edit] External links
- (Danish) Dansk Folkeparti - Official site
- Politics
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